King Leopold's Ghost By Adam Hochschild

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King Leopold's Ghost Summary For my third quarter book project, I read the book "King Leopold's Ghost" written by Adam Hochschild. This book was about King Leopold II and his affects on the Congo, it also included some stories on the resistance of Leopold and the humanitarian society dedicated to stop Leopold's terror in the Congo. The book delves into how Leopold was able to complete his terror in the Congo, and how the people of the world tried to stop him. Leopold like all people was a very complex character and was a bit messed up in the mind, as you can assume from his cutting of Congolese wrists, and shoving them in cages and labializing them as "zoos". In the beginning of the novel, Adam discusses how the Europeans were too afraid to go into Africa, and how they could not get into central Africa because of their boats. After that we discuss Henry Morton Stanley, one of the greatest African explorers of his time and recruited by Leopold II to explore and take over Africa. After a rough life in America and England, Henry explored Africa and found Livingstone another famous African explorer. After finding Livingstone Stanley explored what is now known as the Congo. Leopold understood that the area known as the Congo was the last unexplored land in the world, so he quickly hired Stanley to participate in the Imperialism of the Congo. Of course Leopold told everyone else in the world that the purpose of his presence in the Congo was to simply protect the Congolese and rid them of the Arab Slave traders located in the Area. With other nations at his heels, Leopold quickly told Henry to acquire signed treaties from the Africans to give up their land. It was very probable that the Congo Kings did not know what they were signing and were tricked into these deals. The King of Belgium began to run out of funds until the discovery of rich ivory in the Congo, but even this ivory boom would not totally make up for the king's debt. The material that would make up the debt was rubber, the rubber boom occurred in the
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